💡 The Rise of Digital Twins: From Bruce Willis to Ready Player Me
💡 The Rise of Digital Twins: From Bruce Willis to Ready Player Me
Bella Vorobiov, Associate Director, Data, Digital Assets & Media @ Teva Pharmaceuticals, and Dr. Elhanan Gazit dive in to the future of Digital Twins.
What are the two of the most potent internal motivations we humans have?
Self-expression and ownership.
They serve at the core of the epic success of the video games industry and the Metaverse market growth.
Video games offer us endless ways to make avatars. We can choose to make the avatars similar to us or imaginary and completely different. Avatars are extensions of ourselves by interacting and expressing ourselves in the games. It is very empowering. However, gamers know that their avatars are not their property. They don't own them.
Moving forward, as new immersive and AI technologies innovations progress, it becomes easier to make digital clone twins. Additionally, in a blockchain-based Metaverse, you can own the rights of your second -self.
Join co-author Bella Vorobiov and me as we dive into the Metaverse's disruptive future. GAME-ON!
1# What is a digital twin?
A digital twin is a copy of a person, product, or process created using big data. The concept came to life in Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) in 2002, at the University of Michigan, by Dr. Michael Grieves.
There are different kinds of Human digital twins, all based on AI, Machine Learning, Deep fake, and CGI technologies. For example, a "Human digital thought clone" is a personalized digital twin consisting of a replica of all known data and the behavior of a specific living person. It includes recording their choices, preferences, behavioral trends, and real-time decision-making processes (Grieves, & Vickers, (2017); Truby & Brown, 2021). 1
2# Bruce Willis sold himself to the Deepcake Company. Prepare yourselves for digital cloning today!
That is the first time in human history that a celebrity has partially sold the rights to his recreation to Deepfake Agency- as part of the commercial campaign.
Not only willBruce'ss recreation look precisely like Bruce and sound like Bruce, but he will also even be much younger than he is today. Like Luke Skywalker in Maddenlorian, but better.
How does it work?
It all started in August 2021, from a collaboration between a creative agency specializing in deep-faking and a Russian communications company (МегаФон - Megaphone). In short, they decided to shoot spy sketches with lots of jokes, with Bruce Willis but without Bruce Willis's real presence. After that, Willis' team had to approve the storyboard and final products. A Great way to boost self-promotion OR campaign- in addition, to be used as an opportunity to attract celebrities and Influencers for future collaborations.
For this magic, they used AI technology. First, it created a Willis K4 "digital twin" by loading 34,000 image clips from films such as 'Die Hard' and The 'The Fifth Element straight into software based on machine Learning. Then, the AI engine could superimpose Bruce's face, with "surgical precision," on other actors' faces.
Regarding schedules, the agency claims that the initial process of duplicating Willis's character took 14 days! So every next version should be faster. Still, it's impressive because it requires adjustment to new faces while moving and regarding changing environmental elements.
Bonus: To whom Bruce soled his face and image?
Since the launch of the ad series in question, Bruce became Deepcake'ss calling card, and his image stars throughout their branding products.
In Hollywood, a "clean" Deep Fake that doesn't require any physical involvement from the original actors is treated cautiously. The big studios don't want to damage the "authenticity" of the craft by removing the "human factor" entirely. In addition, their audience's attitude towards technology and its deterring potential can hurt their overall sales. But it seems like the Deepcake company is proposing a different approach.
Although it is a known fact that the star didn't sell the rights to use his image exclusively, I still wonder how much what are the clauses of the contract. I believe this contract should have an expiration date and include clauses on different royalties from using his image.
Another matter related to technology and copyrights is using source materials based on star philography. To my knowledge, the filmmakers and Hollywood's studios were not compensated for using the original footage to create the "Digital Twin Star" for commercial purposes. Additionally, it seems to be a loophole that will probably be closed legally as the phenomenon expands. And there are many reasons for that to happen in the future. For once, using the actor's Deep Fake theoretically significantly lowers production costs.
[Update: Bruce Willis denies selling his digital likeness to Deepfake company ]
In conclusion:
Producing exclusive digital twine clones of yourself, like Bella Hadid in the Metaverse, for example) is not a wrong strategic move.
Moreover, a prolonged digital documentation organization should provide an answer to a contingency plan, the rights belonging to that person, and not to any corporation or commercial entity.
Prepare yourself today for high-quality, fast, and legal digital twin cloning.
Update: The Uncanny Valley Revisited:
Coined in the 1970s by Masahiro Mori, a Japanese roboticist, the Uncanny Valley2 describes the eerie sensation when encountering lifelike robots or avatars that fall just short of true human realism. Beyond visual appearance, interactivity now matters. When users engage with avatars, their reactions transcend the valley. Non-verbal cues and shared interactions bridge the gap.
Enter the Digital Human Avatars: Avatars with photo-realistic human faces, inching toward believability, are becoming our digital alter egos in the metaverse and beyond.
The challenge is to create avatars that evoke affinity, not discomfort. Navigating this delicate balance requires a compass to ensure that digital avatars enhance user experiences without triggering the uncanny and not passing the code of ethics. It's a dance of pixels, empathy, and technological finesse for ensuring business growth.
3# How to DIY a Digital Twin Avatar for the Metaverse?
Ready Player Me
How many times have you wished you had a virtual clone of yourself?
DIY by using Ready Player Me
On their Website, you will find a bold statement:
Ready Player Me exists to break down walls to build a more connected virtual world. We are the avatar interoperability layer for the Metaverse.".
Last month RPM raised $56M in a Series B round led by Andressen Horowitz. (Source: FastCompany).
One Hour AI
Hour One is an AI company specializing in developing virtual humans for use in professional video communications. You can create your own character on the Reals platform and bring it to present your brand here.
Google Research | Photorealistic Monocular 3D Reconstruction of Humans Wearing Clothing at CVPR 2022
Given a single image, we reconstruct the full 3D geometry – including self-occluded (or unseen) regions – of the photographed person, together with albedo and shaded surface color. Our end-to-end trainable pipeline requires no image matting and reconstructs all outputs in a single step.
Project page: https://phorhum.github.io/
Quote of the Week
Our bigger vision is to connect the Metaverse through avatars. There may be Metaverse [experiences] owned by big companies, who will make all the rules, but there is a vision of an open one where people can travel, built by millions of developers, where no one controls the whole thing. Like the internet. We're trying to push the world towards that metaverse".
Timmu Toke, co-founder and CEO at Ready Player Me
AI ART of the Week: The Doom Guy
Let's re-frame the digital human twin and Play it Backwards.
Someone created a realistic facial image profile of an avatar of the successful computer game Doom using artificial neural network technologies. (Source: Futurism)
About the authors:
🕹Dr. Elhanan Gazit is a Ludologist, Speaker, Advisor, and Entrepreneur. Founder @ juloot Consulting Agency, Ex-Founder and CEO @ Metaversense Ltd.
Co-Author Bella Vorobiov is Associate Director, Data, Digital Assets & Media at Teva Pharmaceuticals.
Thank you for reading this newsletter. If you liked it, please share it with a friend who might benefit from it. I welcome your comments and suggestions below. You can find me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram.
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Grieves, M., & Vickers, J. (2017). Digital twin: Mitigating unpredictable, undesirable emergent behavior in complex systems. In Transdisciplinary perspectives on complex systems (pp. 85-113).]
Truby, J., & Brown, R. (2021). Human digital thought clones: the Holy Grail of artificial intelligence for big data. Information & Communications Technology Law, 30(2), 140-168.]
Caballar, R.D. (2023, February 9). What Is the Uncanny Valley? Creepy robots and the strange phenomenon of the uncanny valley: definition, history, examples, and how to avoid it. IEEE Spectrum Retrieved from https://spectrum.ieee.org/what-is-the-uncanny-valley